After returning to India after a few years abroad, a surprising lesson awaited me: Being Indian can be a liability.
As I looked for apartments in New Delhi in recent weeks, it soon became apparent that there's a type of caste-system that prevails among some landlords here.
Of course, landlords, and the real estate brokers who represent them, have every right to be selective when it comes to choosing tenants. But in Delhi, depending on which neighborhood one is looking in, this profiling goes much beyond a check of the tenant's income and background. In upmarket neighborhoods, some landlords decide tenants' suitability depending on their nationality or gender. Bottom line: Foreigners are preferred over Indians. Other landlords don't want to rent to single women.
I was faced with this discrimination a couple of weeks ago, when I called a broker in response to an advertisement on Delhi's Craigslist. This site is populated mostly by brokers, who seem to be targeting a foreign/expatriate community. I zeroed in on an advertisement for a fully-furnished, studio apartment with a terrace for just $400 (approx. Rs. 20,000) per month, in the Defence Colony area of South Delhi. This neighborhood is close to the heart of town and has many nice restaurants and cafes, and understandably very much in demand. While $400 is not exactly a small amount in India, it seemed a pretty good deal.
The broker confirmed that the place was still available and answered a couple of my questions. But as soon as I asked when I could come see it, he told me it would never be mine.
"The landlord only wants to rent it out to foreigners," he said in English.
"What?" I asked. "Why?"
That was just their condition, he said. "Even if you offer to pay twice the advertised rent, you cannot get it."
Well, that left little else to discuss.
Some days later, another broker rejected me for the same reason. Apparently, it wouldn't have even mattered if I were an American citizen; my Indian roots were the problem.
The explanations for this criteria requirements is vague. One broker said that landlords fear that Indians won't vacate the apartment when their lease is up (even though that would be breaking the law), whereas a foreigner would always leave at some point. Another one said landlords believe that foreigners would maintain the apartment better than an Indian.
To be sure, some other landlords in Defence Colony didn't have a problem with my nationality. Still, I feel like I lost out on several potentially good options due to this arbitrary criteria.
Even in the U.S., some landlords and brokers continue to discriminate. But there is no way they could as explicitly as the landlords here do, because the U.S. has stricter fair housing laws. In contrast, in India we can only rely on the Indian Constitution, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of caste, color or religion etc. But there are plenty of "catches" in the law which, in essence, allow landlords to refuse anyone they want, explains Kaviraj Singh, managing partner of Delhi-based law firm Trustman & Co.
This is not a new phenomenon, and is hardly unique to Delhi in a country still trying to shake off its discriminatory caste system. Indeed, people who eat meat and eggs can forget about renting in some posh addresses in Mumbai. These buildings are often primarily occupied by Gujaratis or Jains, two Hindu communities that are strictly vegetarian.
Thankfully, Delhi is more accepting of 'non-vegetarians,' so I didn't strike out on that front. But being a single woman was a negative.
"She plans to rent this apartment?" one potential landlady said to my broker outside her building, as if I wasn't standing right there. "She's too young. I don't think it will be possible." It was unfathomable to her that a single woman would live by herself.
One 85-year landlord said she preferred not to rent out to single women because they might bring over boyfriends to their apartments. Once, she said, explaining away her discrimination, the police showed up after a young woman tenant left with a man at 3 a.m. The cops alleged that there was prostitution going on in the building.
Where my gender has not been an issue, I have been questioned about other details--my religion, caste and sub-caste, because landlords prefer some castes over others.
So distrustful landlords seem of individuals that most prefer what is called a "company lease," with an employer vouching that tenants really will leave. Some landlords will accept a "comfort letter", written by an executive of your company on the letterhead, vouching that you will fulfill all obligations of the lease.
And so I remain on the hunt.
My revised strategy is to widen my search to include other, less foreigner-dominated neighborhoods. When a broker recently asked about my background, I emphasized that I work for an American company and my boss, who is a white American (yes, I specified his skin color) can write a letter to vouch for me. I told him my newspaper is owned by Rupert Murdoch, who owns one of the largest Indian cable TV channels, Star TV. Those foreign ties seemed to please my broker; he called me back within a day to propose three apartments to look at. I just hope the landlords won't slam the
